Assembly of God?

Monday 24th September 2012

So this past week, or well since Wednesday.

 

Since the last time I wrote, my companion and I marked another man for baptism on the 30th of this month. His name is Adriano. He is a member of the Assembly of God church, and so far he is very accepting and wanting to know more. I think it’s working out with this Adriano guy a lot because we are using a member who used to be a member of the Assembly church before he joined the church of Jesus Christ. The member is just telling him straight up why the Assembly of God church is wrong and how they don’t have the authority to do anything. It’s kind of funny, but it’s working. Adriano said he has been praying a lot and I actually saw him pray during sacrament, so that is awesome! Oh, and before he prayed during the sacrament meeting, I saw him reading Moroni chapter 8, which talks about being baptized as a baby is an abomination to the lord. Kind of interesting that he randomly opened to that chapter. Oh and with Adriano’s family, we are trying to get his cousin marked for the same day as well. His name is Bruno. He is a pretty good kid, but the only problem is that his parents are trying to make him not go to church or to be baptized. We will see about that. I think we will see Bruno tonight. Something I learned on my mission so far is that when you know the parents will say no about their child being baptized, you don’t ask! All you do is say that...."we would like to invite you to your child’s baptism, and here is a “for the strength of youth pamphlet” that your child will be learning as he continues in the church. We would hope that you will support your child’s decision and we know that your child would love the support from you." it really helps the parents know that it’s their child’s baptism not theirs. 

Also this past week, I have started a new little language learning goal thing. What I do is that I write five words that I heard that day. Learn what they are and try to say them the next day. And I do this in a cycle for each day. Its working out pretty well and I have learned already quite a few new words this week. Oh and I have been thinking that when I get back I might use my Portuguese to minor in Spanish. Spanish is a lot more useful in the world than Portuguese. It’s good to know your mission language, but why not use it to learn something that will actually help you lol.

 Thank you for the money, it helped.

Oh and guess what I am making for lunch today?

I am making BBQ bacon burgers with caramelized onions.

 

 

Oh and banana bread. but I kind of need the recipe for banana bread. I got the bananas and flour, but don’t know what else goes in it lol. 

 

 

 

I’ve attached just some more random photos, and if you didn’t know the northeast of Brazil is 3rd world.

Unless the President puts you in the richest areas, then it moves up just a little bit lol.

 BTW the rat was in our apartment, but obviously now is dead and burned.

Thank you for the recipe, and no we didn’t eat it the rat!!

 

 

 

 

Last Sunday went very well. We had a total of 7 baptisms in the zone. Actually it was a little too low since we should of had 13, but this next weekend we are all trying to have 11 baptisms in the zone.

Oh and another random thought - you can always be forgiven of sin but the consequences because of that sin will always be there. Just let go of the past and focus on what you’re going to do today, tomorrow and maybe the next day, it feels really good to just let go. Trust in the lord and do your best.

love you,

elder adam jensen 

Family Baptism

Thursday 20 Sep 2012

From: adj1991@myldsmail.net


Hello Everyone,

So this past week...

This past week was pretty good! I had my first man and family baptism this last Sunday! It was João that was baptized, he was the man and because of his baptism he also completed a family. His wife was already a member for a while, but she had left the church for a while as well. Anyway, they are all in the church and excited already for the temple. It’s really cool seeing that blessing in João´s family.

I made splits with this other missionary Monday and Tuesday. I was the Senior companion, because he got demoted to junior and we were in my area. It went pretty well. We had some lessons with members and received a lot of references. The members here really help out a lot. I am actually enjoying this area and everything a lot more. Being the Senior companion was actually good for me. I learned a lot and I also learned that I am actually kind of good at it. I thought it was easy to plan out the day and stick to the schedule and really use the resources that I have around me.

Hmmm... something I learned this week - is that I need to learn a lot more! Especially about the Bible, not to be mean, but it’s because we have the Assembly of God church down here and there are a lot of them!! So when we teach a member of this church, they only like answers in the Bible. I tell them I am not here to convince them, but these members like to be convinced. It’s weird, but we try to emphasize on prayer also with these people.

I didn’t eat anything bad this past week. I actually cooked a lot at the house because here in this area, instead of giving lunch, they sometimes give us money. I actually like it when that happens because I make an awesome lunch. One day I made sloppy joes and for dessert, was a lemon pie. and by the way, both turned out awesome!

One thing, hey so I am running out of money from this transfer. I had to pay a bill and help pay for a new water pump, just some money, not a lot. We have to pay for things with mission money and we get reimbursed for the money we spend, but the reimbursement doesn’t come for an extra month after we spend money on things we shouldn’t have to spend it on. If you can’t then no big deal. I will just try harder to balance my money out.

Well that sums up my week, except that we have three more people that are a very big possibility of being baptized at the end of this month. Oh and I forgot Sean was already 12. Oh well. it’s all good.

with love,

elder adam jensen

p.s. I couldn’t email yesterday because one person from every single companionship was transferred except for my companionship. No one arrived here in Mossoro until late at night. Sorry about yesterday, but I will email on Monday. Oh and we only have forty minutes because for the first 20 minutes I write other emails, I write to President Hall and write you the long letter. I finish everything so I can have a solid 40 minutes of writing to you.

 

Zone Conference and Tranfers

Mon, 10 Sep 2012

From: adj1991@myldsmail.net

Last time I emailed, I was trying to put photos too, but the computers here are not the best lol. They’re kind of old and don’t like to work just the way you want it to, but anyways…

Hello everyone,

This is what happened during this week...

Hmmm, we went to Hipers the sort of Wal-Mart here and they have some things, but the two things I found which was awesome, was actual chocolate sauce, BBQ sauce and Reese’s. that’s about it. The rest of it, is all Brazilian. The only thing that sucks is the ice cream and the milk is different than the states, the closest thing to milk back home is literally the fermented milk which looks like yogurt!! Yummy ~ lol. But it’s all good. I am living with what I’ve got.

I also went to Natal this week for a Zone conference. I saw some people that are in my group and the ones that arrived with me in the field. It was awesome seeing them. One of them I knew sort of, from college and the other lives on Whidbey island. All of them can speak Portuguese very well. I feel like I don’t, but people around me say I speak pretty well.

This past week also...., we cut a family. Their names were Romilo and Nilda they just weren’t progressing, so we told them we were not going to return and we took back the Book of Mormon. After we cut them though, we found a brand new family that lives two streets down from them. The woman was already baptized in 2009, but never was confirmed. She has to be baptized again now, but the only bad thing is that she is living with her boyfriend. We’ve just got to get them to church and married, and then baptized after that. Should be easy ~ lol. We also met another family that is a referral from a member, and this family is the same exact story, except this woman was already confirmed. The man seemed interested and we gave him a Book of Mormon. We tried to mark a part that he could read and we would talk about it the next time we meet, and he said, "no that’s ok, just give me a week. I will start in the beginning and finish it." It was pretty crazy to here that but we need to see him, so we are going to his house on Tuesday. (He doesn’t know we are going there yet lol). Also this past week was crazy because we had so many lessons with members. I created a calendar that would be used to schedule to go out with members. We ended up having 23 lessons this week with members. I would say it was a very good week, except for not baptizing on Sunday, but definitely next week we will.

So tomorrow, I am going to eat BBQ ribs and a cherry pie at the Americans house or school. I don’t know which. That’s what the American here did - he built a school for English. But anyways, I am super excited for that. It should be one of the best meals that I will have on the mission.

The day after the Petrie’s left to come back to Brazil we had our conference at 8 in the morning. President and Sister Hall were probably not even home when the Petrie’s arrived. The airplane ride from the United States to Brazil is about 24 hours, so I didn’t think I would get the gift/package in time from them but its ok. Oh and we went to Natal last Thursday, the mission hires a van or a bus to take us to these conferences. It was a descent bus and I was able to sleep some of the way there. We left at 3:30am and got there at 8:30am. We were the only Zone that arrived late. During the conference the food was cooked by some members. The food was similar to what we always have and not American but a huge bonus was that we had a big cake at the end!!

This upcoming Sunday is going to be a super baptism Sunday. Everyone from the Zone is going to baptize in our chapel. So at 7:30 p.m. on Sunday everyone will be baptized in our Zone. We have 14 people marked for this upcoming Sunday in the zone. Personally I only have one person marked for baptism, with two other people that could possibly be baptized. It should be an awesome Sunday!! Just as long as everything works out the way it should!

 Hmm I think that was about the week. My new companion works a little harder. He is a cool guy and the Zone leaders are cool too. Except the Zone leaders are both gone by January, and my comp has less than one year now. Actually 11 months left. This is my second companion that has completed one year when I have been with them. It’s pretty crazy!! I am almost at 7 months completed. I do have 17 months of 24 left. They all seem to be having a good time on their missions. When I went to Natal I did not receive any mail - nothing! I think that means October, not a big deal unless something won’t last until then!!

Thank goodness they are going to trade everything in for a PS3. That’s awesome and I still approve!!!

But I have to go now. I love you a lot and have a good week. Oh and next Monday is not p-day. It is transfer week. I will email on Wednesday. Sorry. Transfer days suck I know lol.

I Love you!

with love,

elder adam jensen

Watching what I eat!

September 3rd, 2012

From: adj1991@myldsmail.net

Hi Everyone

So this past week....

This week was a normal week, with a lot of hard work but not much success in the end with a baptism. The one baptism that we could have had, the friend of the investigator told him that he should go to church more then decide. He has already been to church plenty of times and he believes in it all. It confused me why the member friend said this. Oh well. We got the member friend more excited for our investigators baptism because we told him that he could baptize his friend. The member seemed pretty happy about that. Especially since the member is leaving on a mission in like a month or so. I actually don’t understand this Mission. It’s all about baptisms, and the retention rate in this mission is one of the lowest. 

This past week we also had a guy call us over to him and asked us about the church and the Book of Mormon. He started off saying that he read half of the book of Mormon, but he recently moved and he had lost his old one. For some reason we never gave him another one at that moment, but I guess it’s because we are going to his house soon and if we give him another Book of Mormon, we can also give him a lesson as well. His name is Roberto. It’s more of a Spanish name, but it’s all good.

We also met another man, and his name is João or John in English. John and his wife who is already a member for a long time, but she has been inactive, but we went there during the week, and got them to go to church, and we also marked John´s baptism for next Sunday. He seemed pretty excited and the wife was super happy to go back to church. There literally was a different attitude about both of them after church. It was awesome!!

Also this past week I ate some things lol.....last Monday, I ate a bunch of sausage and flat steak over a BBQ pit. It was pretty good! Then on Sunday for lunch I also ate some more of the same things as Monday, except for one thing, I also ate some cooked pig skin. It didn’t taste bad at all. I actually liked it, but after I ate two small pieces, I really looked at the skin and I saw that on the skin there was still some hair on the skin. It looked like nose hairs!!! It totally grossed me out a lot and I stopped eating it. But this morning I woke up having to go to the bathroom, and I was in there for a while. I am pretty sure I got a small bug from the meat from Sunday lunch, but oh well...it passed....with persistence comes a victory lol!! Yeah we are making the BBQ ourselves. Hmm, but it was still a little soft, the skin was, and the outside was really crispy, along with the hairs lol.

Oh and today for lunch we are going to eat BBQ chicken. We found BBQ sauce! Oh and we are going to a store called Heepers. It’s owned by Wal-Mart. I heard there are some Reeses there and peanut butter. I am super excited for that! 

On the 11th, all of the Elders in my house are going to the Americans’ house here to have a BBQ and a moment of silence. I am excited. something really really American soon! I am also speaking in Portuguese a lot now.

Well that was the week.
I love you,

elder adam jensen

Pizza Sunday's!

Mon, 27 Aug 2012 11:35:37 -0300

From: adj1991@myldsmail.net

So this past week...

This past week we had four planned baptisms and two of the four people are a family. The family are great and love to hear the messages, but something went wrong this week and they were never home so we could not prepare them for this Sunday to be baptized! Also, this week the husband is traveling for a week so we can’t mark his baptism again this Sunday because he will be gone. It kind of sucks. The other two people we had marked were a brother and sister. The sister was totally ready and had no problems. The brother also travelled a lot and we taught him enough to be baptized, but by the time Sunday morning came around they both said they were not prepared and didn’t want to be baptized. so basically this past week, we had amazing numbers, like the numbers you should have if you’re supposed to have four baptisms, but the success at the end of the week really really sucked. So now we have to keep teaching and wait for them to decide when they are going to be baptized. but I did notice at the end of the day yesterday, that in this mission we are so focused on baptism, that we sometimes look past as to what the investigator really needs or wants. maybe that was the issue this past week.

Oh and we met another cool guy outside of the bar and invited him for this Sunday to go to church, like inviting on a whim, but on Sunday when we got to church he pulled into the parking lot and came. He liked church a lot and he was so excited afterwards to learn more. I think we can prepare him for this Sunday. Here in the north east, there is a problem with the law of chastity with all the missionaries’ investigators. It makes it kind of difficult sometimes for them to obey or want to obey that commandment. We have to teach it and try to get them to live that law.

Also this past week....nothing much else happened. We have finally met an awesome woman that is already a member and she has planned to feed the missionaries every Sunday night after the second sacrament meeting. She feeds us small homemade pizza. The pizza is ok, but it’s better than nothing. She is an awesome woman!! Oh and right before someone gets transferred she buys a hammock for the missionary. The hammocks here are awesome and way better than back home. I love them!!

The Zone Leaders found out about my blog and how I wrote about them through a recent convert that was thinking about me lol, but it was pretty funny when they found out I called them liars, but oh well. All is awesome here in Mossoró. Hey I got to go now, but Mossoro is good!!

com amor,

elder adam jensen

You can contact Elder Adam Jensen at:
Brazil Joao Pessoa Mission
Rua Deputado Jose Mariz, #515
Tambauzinho 58042 - 020
Joao Pessoa - PB Brazil

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